Hold on tight!

Aug. 20, 2005

Volunteer Gerry West shows off the Fresnel lens inside the Cape Blanco Lighthouse. The lens has been in place since 1935, though the lighthouse was built in 1870. / THOMAS PATTERSON | STATESMAN JOURNAL

Written by

ROY GAULT

Statesman Journal

Cape Blanco Lighthouse

Where: Six miles north of Port Orford

Height: At 256 feet above sea level, Cape Blanco's light is the highest of any in Oregon. The 59-foot lighthouse tower sits atop a 200-foot cliff.

Built: The lighthouse was constructed from materials on site and materials off-loaded from ships that would anchor off its southern cliffs. It became operational on Dec. 20, 1870, and is the oldest continuously operating lighthouse on the Oregon Coast.

Light: The six-foot, eight-inch-tall lens was hand made in France by Augustin Jean Fresnel and -- as it turns -- it flashes for 1.8 seconds every 18.2 seconds. The 320,000-candlepower light is visible 28 miles out to sea. The light was switched from oil to electricity in 1936 and runs on 1,000-watt bulbs.

Public Access: Visitor hours are from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Thursdays-Mondays, and a locked gate keeps visitors a half mile from the lighthouse outside of those hours to protect Native American burial grounds. Guided tours are offered April through October. The fee to climb the stairs to the lens room is $2. Ages 15 and younger are admitted free.

Deluxe Tour: For a first-class tour complete with 1800s-costumed guides, hot chocolate and sweet-dried cranberries, call Lighthousekeeper, a commercial operation, at (541) 332-2750. Tours are by appointment only, must be arranged at least 24 hours in advance and cost $35 per person.

History: H. Burnap was the lighthouse's first keeper, and when Mable E. Bretherton took that job in 1903, she was the first woman lighthouse keeper in Oregon. James Langlois and James Hughes are the best-documented of the keepers. Hughes, the keeper for 28 years, grew up on a 2,000-acre ranch adjacent to the lighthouse. Langlois, the keeper for 42 years, farmed 500 acres nearby and has a community along Highway 101, just north of the lighthouse, named after him. The cape is surrounded by shipwrecks, including the 1919 sinking of an oil freighter in which only three of the 39 on board survived. The ship hit one of thousands of huge rocks, most of them submerged, off the point of the cape.

Information: The lighthouse is owned by the U.S. Coasts Guard but is managed by the Bureau of Land Management, which can be reached at (541) 756-0100, or call Friends of Cape Blanco at (541) 332-0248.

Port Orford

Where: Port Orford is 25 miles south of Bandon and 55 miles north of the Oregon-California border. It is six miles south of Cape Blanco.

Camping: Cape Blanco State Park is adjacent to the lighthouse. Most campsites are in spruce and pine timber and are relatively protected from the constant wind. The park has 53 campsites, all with electric hookups, and has four cabins, which can be reserved by calling (800) 452-5687. About 10 miles south is Humbug Mountain State Park, with 63 campsites. Frank Eckley is the manager and can be reached at (541) 332-6774. The Bureau of Land Management also has campgrounds along Sixes River Road, on the east side of Highway 101 from Cape Blanco, and those campers can bask in 75 degree fall temperatures when it's a chilly 55 a few miles away on the cape.

Lodging: Castaway by the Sea, 545 W Fifth St., Port Orford, with a view of the Port of Port Orford and Humbug Mountain; the rooms are mostly suites with sun porches, prices are $55 to $145, depending on the room and the season; call (541) 332-4502. Sea Crest Motel, one mile south of Port Orford, prices are $43 to $76, depending on the room and the season, call (541) 332-3040.

Dining: Wheelhouse Restaurant, next to Battle Rock Park in downtown Port Orford, has fare ranging from a turkey dinner to red snapper or sea scallops. Nearly next door is The Crazy Norwegian's Fish and Chips, at 259 Sixth St., with slightly less formal fare. A local favorite is the Paradise Café, at 518 19th St. on the north end of downtown Port Orford. All three restaurants are on Highway 101.

Hiking: Grassy Knob Wilderness Trail, a moderate one-mile hike on an old road and trail to the site of a lookout at an elevation of 2,300 feet that was used for fire protection and to watch the coast for Japanese ships and airplanes during World War II. Access is from Forest Road 196, then Forest Road 5105, about five miles east of Cape Blanco. The 17,200-acre wilderness is rugged and steep with thick brush and old growth stands of Douglas fir and Port Orford cedar. For more information, call Siskiyou National Forest at (541) 439-6200.

Fishing: The Sixes River, on north of Cape Blanco, and the Elk River, south of the cape, have substantial runs of fall chinook and winter steelhead -- runs that usually are a couple of months later than runs of the same species on other coastal rivers.

Woodworking: Port Orford is in the heart of Oregon's myrtlewood country, and owners Dave and Kathy Takahashi have an inventory of thousands of handmade myrtle products at Zumwalt's Myrtlewood Factory and Gift Shop, 47422 Highway 101, 20 miles north of Port Orford. They specialize in bowls of all sizes, but also have tables made from slabs from 200-year-old myrtlewood trees. Call: (541) 756-9669.

Hughes House: An example of Victorian architecture, the Hughes ranch house, adjacent to Cape Blanco State Park, was built in 1898 and framed with old-growth Port Orford cedar. The 3,000-square-foot house, just above the banks of the Sixes River, cost $3,800 to complete and includes a chapel. The house is open to tours conducted by Friends of Cape Blanco from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Thursdays-Mondays, April through October. Private group tours can be arranged by calling (541) 332-0248. The Hughes operated a 2,000-acre ranch after moving to the south Oregon Coast in 1855 in search of gold. The house was built with indoor plumbing, but electricity didn't come until 1942.

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The first thing a visitor notices, ironically, never is the white cliffs for which Cape Blanco was named in 1603 by Spanish explorer Martin de Aguilar.

It isn't the herd of Roosevelt elk that graze in the pastures on the cape's north slope, nor is it the run after run of salmon and steelhead that surround the cape as they swim up the Elk River and Sixes River on the north and south flanks of the headland.

The thing that strikes you first day after day after day at Cape Blanco blasts you square in the face: the wind.

"A lady who lived out here as a child, when her father was a lighthouse keeper, said the only way you could get between buildings at times was to crawl on your hands and knees," said Bob Mitchell of Ravensdale, Wash., campground host at Cape Blanco State Park.

On this summer day, the wind is a steady 70 mph from the south, and Dave Meyers of Port Orford has brought his children to the cape to lean into the wind. It's something they often do in weather like this, Meyers said, as two girls and a boy are supported like boat sails as they stand at nearly a 45-degree angle.

The only thing unusual about today is that a typical summer fare would be a north wind that would come more in gusts than in a steady gale.

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